Court hears machete man acted in self-defence

Jessica Grewal
Senior Reporter APN Newsdesk NSW Bureau
Working from Sydney, Jessica specialises in crime/court reporting, filing for APN’s regional mastheads in Northern NSW as well as providing national content for the group.
She was previously Chief Reporter at the Fraser Coast Chronicle in Hervey Bay, Queensland where she grew up and trained.
Early in her career, she was named Queensland Young Journalist of the Year at the Clarion Awards.
More recently, she was finalist at the 2013 Kennedy Awards for Excellence in NSW Journalism in both the...

A MAN who took to an unwelcome visitor with a machete was "entitled to defend himself in his own home", a court has heard.

Neil George Woodham faces charges of unlawful wounding and assaults occasioning bodily harm over the night he allegedly slashed Dallas Hislop in the chest and arms.

Woodham had previously met Mr Hislop and his partner at Torquay Beach in September last year and the three had formed a friendship based on mutual interests in music.

Over the next two months they spent several nights together drinking and playing guitars, but the court heard the friendship soured when Woodham apparently "started smacking the couple's dog around the head".

The prosecution alleged that despite being asked not to contact the couple, Woodham kept calling.

One night last November, Mr Hislop decided he wanted to go to Woodham's house and retrieve a harmonica he had given to him as a gift.

The court heard his partner agreed to go with him "in case things get nasty" and that when they arrived at the front door, Woodham grabbed Mr Hislop and began "waving" the machete around before inflicting injuries which later required 27 stitches.

The jury was shown two images - one of Woodham's face which appeared bloody and bruised and another of Mr Hislop's face which appeared unharmed.

Woodham's defence barrister argued his client had also been injured, that Mr Hislop had punched him in the face and that he was defending himself.